What is the OSBBC?
The Ontario Straw Bale Building Coalition (OSBBC) was formed to serve several purposes:
- To provide information for people with an interest in building and/or owning a straw bale home. These services include general information, facilitating training courses, and providing testing data for building designers and building inspectors.
- To initiate and support efforts to further the base of knowledge about straw bale building, including studies and tests leading to the building code acceptance of straw bale building techniques.
- To foster a community of builders and owners involved in straw bale building to promote the exchange of ideas, resources, and social opportunities.
The Goals of the OSBBC
The OSBBC believes in the need for a movement towards a more environmentally responsible built environment. By using materials with the lowest possible embodied energy and toxicity and employing them in buildings designed to maximize the potential for renewable energies and minimizing the use of fossil fuels, we can make a substantial positive change in our impact on the environment. For the same costs as typical homes and buildings it is possible right now to create similar spaces from environmentally sound materials and to lower energy consumption dramatically. We hope to promote these strategies by assisting builders and owners to adopt them and to help to introduce them into the mainstream building world.
